JUMPER New Breed, New War
by wideawakemymistake
Summary: It's been several years. Davy and Griffin have joined forces and are tracking Jumper Jeremy Matthews. He's a new breed of Jumper, but there's a new breed of Paladin. It's the start of an age old battle of Paladin vs Jumper, and it's twice as dangerous.
1. Chapter 1

**disclaimer:**

As much as I think I would enjoy owning _Jumper_, I do not.

And, as much as I know I _really _would enjoy owning Jamie Bell, I do not.

I do, however, own Jeremy, and the idea for this story.

**PROLOGUE:**

It's been several years since the end of Roland Cox. For a while, the Paladin disappeared and things were back to normal for Davy Rice and Griffin--they went their separate ways, keeping in touch whenever they needed to.

They've been tracking Jumpers for the past few years, just keeping an eye on them and making sure they don't get into trouble, trying to keep them safe from the clutches of rogue Paladin (paladin that don't really have any specific affiliation). Right now, however, there's only one jumper _to_ track. Jeremy Matthews is the seventeen-year-old Jumper, running away from the Paladin for most of his life without really knowing who they were or what they had the potential to do. It's been a hell of running, hiding, and escaping for him, all on instinct, but he's the first in a new breed of Jumpers.

Lucky for him, whenever there's a new breed of Jumpers, a new breed of Paladin spring up, too.

Funny how those things work out, huh?

Davy and Griffin want him on their side, to help them bring down this new empire of Paladin that has been growing.

But before any of that happens, a rescue has to take place.

* * *

It's really hard to think straight when you have ten thousand volts of electricity coursing through your veins. 

Just thought you might want to know that.

Several minutes ago, I had jolted awake, realizing that I was in danger, but not really knowing how or what had happened to put me in such danger.

Several minutes ago, I had tried to get the hell out of wherever I was.

Several minutes ago, I had gotten shocked back into reality, and my mind was all over the place.

Usually my first instinct is to jump away from danger, but I came to an awful realization while laying there in the bed:

When I made an attempt to jump, ten thousand volts of electricity found its way through my veins.

It had taken me several minutes to calm down and gather my surroundings. I was laying down in a really dark room…it felt hospital-esque. I was propped up a little bit, making breathing a little easier, but for the most part, I couldn't move. Both of my wrists were secured down, and moving my head just made it hurt.

I could hear a monitor beeping softly in the background, telling me all about my pulse and blood pressure.

A door on the far side of the room opened, light spilling into the dark room, creating light puddles on the floor. A man entered, looked at me, then shut the door behind him, apparently pleased that I was awake.

"Hello there, Jeremy."

He advanced on the foot of the bed, walking into my view so I could get a good look at him. The man was young—I could tell he had a lot of potential and ideas behind his blue eyes. Maybe even a little bit of malice there, too. He was tall, taller than I am standing up. Fair blonde hair, unlike my brown locks. Pale skin, like he hadn't been outside in a really long time.

And his voice made me sick to my stomach.

He fiddled with a folder that he held in his hands, watching me, unnerving me.

"How are you feeling?" he said at length, opening the folder that had my name, MATTHEWS, JEREMY, clearly marked on it. I didn't answer the question that was posed.

He closed the folder.

"You…are a difficult kid to catch, my friend."

A dry laugh escaped him. "I mean, really. You leave no jump scar. You're quick. And, what, you've only been doing this for…" he flipped the folder open with a flick of his thumb, looking for the answer to his question, which I already knew was twelve years.

"Twelve years. Since you were five. So, you can imagine that I was rather pleased to find you sleeping, unsuspecting, one night. I would have thought you would have been more careful."

A look passed over his face. Something like…greed. Whatever it was, it made my stomach churn more than it already was. He moved to the side of the bed and started working on the bands on my wrists.

"My name is Owen Holfeld. You and I will be getting to know each other very well over the next few days…or rather; I'll be getting to know you."

When both my wrists were freed, I sat up and stared at him carefully. Teleportation would do me no good right now; however, mind-reading would be an ability that I would gladly accept at this point in time. Owen pointed to my wrist.

"That bracelet is specially modulated for you. When you try to jump, it will shock you back into reality with ten thousand volts of pure electric shock."

He headed back towards the door. When he had his hand on the handle, he turned to me with a feral grin.

"So, I wouldn't try jumping anywhere, anytime soon. I will see you later, my friend."

Owen left. I stared after him.

The bracelet on my wrist looked like any other hospital bracelet—my name and age, and my blood type. It also had Owen's name on it. There was a little transmitter on the part where it clipped to itself. The actual part with the print on it was made with dura-plastic, making it impossible to rip with my teeth or even a knife.

I didn't know who these people were, but I knew what they wanted.

They wanted to rip me apart and figure me out. Figure out how I could teleport.

And when they were done with that…I was dead.

I had to get out of here.

* * *

Hundreds of thousands of miles away, David Rice stood in an alleyway between two apartment buildings. He was in New York once again, anxiously awaiting word. This had been the agreed meeting place, hadn't it? Where was he? 

Seconds after this thought had crossed his mind, Griffin was in front of him, sand falling off of his shoulders.

"The Paladin have him," he said breathlessly, running a hand through his hair and sending sand flying once again. David groaned.

"So they're back for sure...?"

"Yeah. But they actually took him away this time. They didn't just do the noble thing and kill him right there and then. I was following him around Tokyo, and he waltzed into an alleyway for some reason, and that's when they just jumped him. He never even had a chance."

David shook his head. "We have to go get him...we can't just stand around and track him anymore. He's wandered into dangerous territory."

"I agree. But he's in the middle of nowhere in a secret facility. I can't get a look inside to see him. Windows are all blacked out."

"We'll jump there tomorrow…see if we can get him. If we can, we'll jump him back to your apartment, get him on our side, and see what we can do."

Griffin grinned. "And so the war begins again. Took me fuckin' forever to find him. The kid doesn't leave a jump scar at all."

Three years ago, they had reunited under the idea that they would work together to bring down the Paladin, which was a success…for a while. Now they were dealing with a whole new breed of Paladin, a whole new breed of Jumper (only one of which they actually knew existed), and, knowing that they couldn't take out this new breed of Paladin all by themselves, had dedicated the first part of their mission to finding other jumpers. There were two problems with this, though. One, despite the fact that the majority of the Paladin were gone at that time, the remaining few had picked off the remaining jumpers that were Davy and Griffin's age. Now there were only three that they knew of, including themselves. And the third was a seventeen-year-old boy that didn't even know they existed.

"We should have shown ourselves to him long before this happened," Griffin said, watching Davy closely. David shook his head.

"We would have scared the shit out of him. It was best to just leave him be."

"Oh, yeah, leave him be without parents, siblings, family. Money, even. The kid is too noble—he won't jump into a bank to get money or anything. And now he could die because we were too scared to scare the shit out of him. You know what those Paladin are capable of, David."

David watched Griffin carefully in return. "Why are you so bent on saving him?"

Griffin scoffed. "Well, for the first thing, he's a human being. We should save him from the awful death that we BOTH know he's going to get if he stays with the Paladin. He would be such help to us, Davy. He doesn't leave a jump scar. These are new Paladin...nothing like Roland. They will pick him apart and try to figure out how he does it. He won't survive two days in that facility. You saw what happened to Skeez."

Skeez had been a jumper that they had been tracking for a while before he mysteriously disappeared. His body was discovered by Davy, discarded in the ocean, waiting to be devoured by sharks that roamed the waters.

Davy nodded, giving Griff a wary eye. "That can't be all…"

Griffin just gave Davy a rather obnoxious scowl. "He's just like me when I was younger. I know that if the Paladin had caught me and planned things to do to me, I'd want to be rescued."

"I'm not saying we're not going to rescue him…"

"Good. Because I have plans for this kid. We let him die, that's two deaths we have over our heads."

They agreed on a time and a place to meet so Griffin could jump them to the facility where their mystery jumper was being held. The meeting had gone forth as planned, and a rescue was in order.

But the adventure was just beginning.  
And so was the New War.

* * *

** I'm a big fan of those things we call 'reviews'. Yeah?**


	2. Chapter 2

Time went slowly over the next few days. I tried not to think about what was going to happen to me, or my aching stomach, or why I was here in the first place.

It had been so sudden.

For the past three years, I'd managed to get by perfectly well on my own.

Well, for the most part. Mostly it was just me jumping around, scrounging around for food and just chilling out. I couldn't go to school—I'd jumped out of foster care when I was fourteen. After a while of being listed as a missing child, I eventually just sort of fell off the face of the earth from the system. I lived my life the way I wanted to.

I'd figured out jumping when I was about twelve. It had happened twice in the time period between five, when I did it the first time, and twelve. After several years of learning the twists and turns of it, I finally got it down. So technically, Owen was wrong: I'd only been _really_ jumping for a few years.

The most important part was—I was always careful. I never jumped in public places, I never told anyone what I could do, and I didn't believe that there were other people out there like me.

Apparently there are.

Or…were.

From what I gathered, these people that were holding me had some moral obligation to wipe out all the people who could jump. Several people they just killed on capture, and then, some they locked up for days at a time so they could see how this whole jumping thing worked.

I swung my legs over the side of the bed. Human contact was becoming rare in here, and it was only once every six hours that someone came in to give me a bottle of water—but no food.

The last water bottle I had received lay abandoned on the floor. I stared at it for a minute, thinking.

Living on the streets for three years, I assume most people would probably think my book smarts were rather lacking. However, I had a penchant for books. I hate to toot my own horn here, but I am rather well educated for quitting school in 8th grade. I'm a big fan of public libraries where I can read for free. Especially those travel books, because those really let me jump.

The way jumping worked for me, I could jump wherever I wanted, whenever I wanted…regardless of whether I'd been there before or not. I only needed to see a picture of the place.

Though, that wouldn't really help me out here, because I couldn't see what it was like outside, and I assumed nobody could see in.

But I had seen outside the door. It led to a discrete hallway, illuminated only by artificial light.

I stared at the bracelet. If I could get it off or break it somehow, I could jump out to the hallway and try to get away.

The first thing I did was try smash it against the wall.

I learned my lesson quickly—any sudden force against it, and it would send 15000 volts through my body instead of ten.

After calming down from that, I tried prying open the top so I could study the mechanism. That didn't work. It was screwed shut, two lids screwed together, with only a small crack that I could barely get open.

Then I saw it.

In the foreground, while I was staring at my wrist, the water bottle, still half-full because I preserved it, lay on the ground.

I grinned and checked the time on the wall. I had ten minutes before someone came in to check on me, if that.

I got to work.

* * *

"How're we going to do this?"

Griffin stood with Davy near the edge of a sand dune, looking down on a small entrance that looked like it led underground. Just seconds previously, Griffin had jumped the two of them, immediately following a plan made to get Jeremy out of there.

"I'll grab him…and jump him back to the apartment," Griffin said. "While I look for him, distract everyone."

He clapped a hand onto Davy's upper arm. "You're good at not being very discrete."

Before Davy could retaliate, Griffin was gone, and soon Davy realised why—someone was leaving the entrance, and he could see clearly into the doorway.

He jumped.

* * *

I had successfully short circuited the bracelet—now when I jumped, it only shocked me with about twenty volts. Perfect.

I really had thought they would have been smarter than just leaving me with a transmitter that could be short circuited by a little water.

(Well, actually a lot of water, but still…)

The person who had come in to check on me had suspected nothing, especially since I gave them my trademark 'annoyed/sulk/I'm gonna kill you' teenager look. Cliché, I know, but still. I have to act brooding if I wantthem to leave me alone.

Since I had no mental image of what lay on the other side of the door, I took care to get a good glance outside the door when they entered and when they left. After the door shut behind them, I counted to 120, then jumped.

On the other side of the door was the dark hallway that I had seen before.

I knew I should have jumped away, right at that moment.

But I'm a seventeen year old male.

Curiosity never killed one of them, right?

I wander down the hall, past several rooms with windows, none of which had people behind them. However, just as I was deciding that maybe now would be a good time to leave, I saw it.

There was this big screen that encompassed an entire wall that had to have been something like eleven by sixteen. On the screen were several pictures, some dimmed out, several, though, were still regular colour.

My eyes scanned over the screen. There were two pictures of me, one taken back when I was fourteen, when I had gotten arrested and ended up with a mugshot from the police, and another that had been taken several days ago. Underneath my name it said 'subject 009 to be terminated' in bold red letters.

There were several arrows that connected me to a network of people. An orange [J next to a name indicated that they were a jumper, I assumed. I was connected to nine other jumpers, seven of which were crossed out.

All of my family's names were crossed out.

I felt sick to my stomach all of a sudden, suddenly felt incredibly weak.

Behind me, I didn't even see the person ready to reach out and grab me with a cord that had twenty thousand volts of electricity running through me—enough to kill me.

Instead, I heard a soft 'Boo!', a crackle of electricity. I whirled around and was promptly hit in the stomach with those twenty thousand volts, and I felt myself fly to the ground, convulsing in what can only be described as insurmountable pain.

I heard that distinctive sound that is made when someone jumps, but I wasn't sure if it was actual jumping or just the sound of electricity in my ears. I saw people running down the hallway towards us when I tipped my head upwards, letting out a small groan.

Someone screamed 'grab the kid!'

And then two people lunging at me, one grabbing me around the wrist, intent on slapping another electric bracelet on me, the other grabbing my waist and….

…_jumping_?

* * *

If I thought ten thousand volts was bad, then twenty thousand volts was my own personal taste of hell. I felt like I had been fried, which, in a sense, I had. All my joints ached and all my muscles were unbelievably tense. I was so incredibly sore.

I was laying down now, and for some reason, I couldn't think of anywhere to jump to. My first instinct was escape. But then I gathered my surroundings.

I was laying down on a rather nice bed, with sheets and everything. I was still in my clothes from the past few days, however, to my left were clean jeans, a t-shirt and a hoodie that I assumed were for me.

On top of them lay a note.

_dont leave. we're not gonna hurt you, kid. change and come out into the main room and get food to eat._

_ps. hope you like chinese because i refuse to go out and get something else._

_pps. shower before you change and come out._

_ppps. again, promise we wont hurt you._

I checked the label on the pants before putting them on, arching an eyebrow slightly. They were brand new—the pricetag was still hanging off of the belt loop. Same deal with the shirt and the hoodie.

I found the shower adjoined to the room, and a towel waiting.

I stood in the shower for half an hour, just letting the scalding hot water pour down my back, through my hair and pool around my bare feet.

It felt so good to be clean, and, possibly, safe.

After I got out of the shower and had shimmied my way into the jeans, pulled the shirt on over my head and tugged the hoodie on to keep me warm, I wandered out through the door. My dark hair, still wet, tickled and trickled about my shoulders.

When I got into the main room, I was greeted by an…interesting sight. It was two guys, one who was poring over a macbook, randomly typing in a key here or there, and the other who was sitting cross-legged on the ground, muttering at the TV with a game controller in his hand. Finally, he threw it to the ground, apparently a little pissed off, and turned to look at me.

"Finally decided to wake up, yeah?"

I said nothing. The guy on the laptop looked up at me as well.

"Ignore him. He's just mad because he lost."

"If you hadn't jinxed me, I wouldn't have lost. I never lose."

The guy that sat in front of the TV jumped to the fridge and back, returning with a Coke in his hand. I arched an eyebrow. He grinned at me.

"Weren't expecting that, were ya?"

I shrugged. The guy on the laptop closed it and put it down on the table next to him.

"Just so you know, we're not here to hurt you. We're here to—"

"Enlist you to fight against the Paladin," the gamer guy interrupted, plopping himself down in front of the TV again. I looked at the computer guy.

"What?"

He sighed. "I'll explain later. You hungry?"

I nodded. He jumped to the fridge and returned with one of those little Chinese take out boxes that holds food. He held it out to me, along with a plastic fork.

There was a small distance between us. I closed the gap with a short jump, taking the box from his hands. Opening the flap and with my head still downward, I said, without looking up:

"Who are you?"

"I'm David, and he's Griffin. You're at the apartment we use as a control center, so to speak."

"Also known as the Lair," Griffin offered from the sofa. David shook his head, rolling his eyes. I jumped to the sofa and sat down.

"And you guys can…"

"Jump? No, we're faeries that just can magically poof in and out of places. Can't you tell by the fucking wings and pixie dust that Davy's throwing around?"

I cracked a smile. Griffin paused the game and jumped to sit next to me, grinning in return.

"Yes. We can. You didn't think you were the only one, did you? I have to admit, though, you were way more careful than Davy was when he started."

"He's _able_ to be more discreet," Davy said, exasperated. "He doesn't leave a scar!"

"Scar?"

"It's this thing you leave behind when you jump that allows other jumpers and more importantly, the Paladin to follow you."

I stopped mid-chew. "The who?" I said, though, with food in my mouth, it sounded more like 'muh who?'

David and Griffin exchanged a glance. Griffin used his hands as a headrest.

"They're the sons-of-bitches that wanted to kill you, kid. Or, actually, they probably still do. I think we pissed them off when we took you away…"

"They have a name?"

"Have for years," Davy said.

"We've been going after them for years," Griffin said. "And we've been tracking you for years."

I put the box of Chinese down.

"What do you want with me?"

Davy jumped in front of where I sat and sat down on the coffee table.

"We need your help, Jeremy."

* * *

**Reviewsdrug.**

**xx. lsh.**

**I've found the perfect place to put Mily into this story, now. ) **


	3. Chapter 3

**Christ, you guys are amazing. The reviews I get are cool and I really do appreciate the concrit. I love you kids. 3333 loveee )  
**

**I'm not sure how I feel about this chapter. I liked developing Jeremy a little more. So, tell me what you think, but the next one will be an adventure.**

** At least I hope so. **

**I got two pints of blood taken out today, then they stuck it in a centrifuge, and shot the plasma back into my arm. It was cool, but I'm so lightheaded I feel blitzed. **

**MINOR WARNING:**

**If you haven't read the books, there's something in here that you may not want to know...it'll be in future movies, according to things that I've read, but it has to do with Mily. I don't think it'll be too much of a shocker...but if you don't want to know, then don't read this chapter. It does, however, have a lot of information about Jeremy's past.**

* * *

My secret locations had come back to my mind after a few hours of not getting shocked with electricity, so I had made a quick jumping trip to where I stashed all my stuff and brought it back to the apartment (the Lair…whatever…) so I could have easy access to it. I wasn't completely sure about whether or not these Paladin characters knew where I stashed my stuff, so I thought it safer to move until I got an actual hiding place. I wasn't too worried about anyone reading anything that I had written in my field notebook—it was mostly just random words scribbled here and there and a few names on my part. It didn't really have a whole lot of information that anyone else would have cared about…at least, I didn't think so.

When I got back from my last jump, Griffin was leaning in the doorway, watching me. I couldn't tell if he was scowling or if it was his natural expression, but it was unnerving me a little bit.

"What?" I asked incredulously. He continued to stare.

"Where have you been?"

"Places."

"Doing what?"

"Stuff."

"Cut the one word answers, kid, you can't go jumping around like you're fucking free to do whatever you want."

"Why the hell not?"

He came further into the room, shutting the door behind him.

"Number one," he says, crossing his arms. "Obviously the Paladin know who you are. They know what you're capable of. The fact that they were able to capture you and hold you is bad enough, but now that you're going out and basically holding a sign in front of their faces saying 'Here I am! Come get me!' is just going to get you killed. They know you're not stupid. I, however, am beginning to think otherwise."

I glared at him but the look was missed. He continued on his tirade.

"If you were smart, you wouldn't have gotten captured in the first place—"

"How was I supposed to know that there were even people out there like these Palawhatevers? I didn't even know they existed until you told me what their name was! It's not my fault!"

"Then whose is it?"

He gave me a cocky grin, daring me to reply. I regretted the outburst and crossed my arms.

"How am I supposed to_know_ that there are people out there like them that are after me, that want to kill me?"

"Because you can jump," he said, as if I didn't know that. "Did you really think nobody would notice? You're just like David: you don't look before you leap. You think you're _so_ careful and _so _good at not letting anyone see you, but people _do_ see, whether you want them to or not! It's a fact of life. Nothing in this world goes unnoticed. You can jump like David and I can't, and even Mily can jump, even though she doesn't use it quite as often because she's a chick and chicks are just…weird."

He shook his head in disdain, like he was regretting ever finding out that David's wife could jump. Then he continued.

"The Paladin are always coming up with new weapons, new ways to kill us—to kill you. You slipped through their fingers once, but they're not going to let that happen again. The next time they get a hold of you_ they will kill you_," he said, vehemence in his voice. I'm not sure if it was intentional or not, but I backed away a little. The backs of my legs hit the edge of the bed.

"If you get caught again," he drew his hand across his neck with a click of his tongue.

"You're a goner, kid. They'll kill you. Now that they know what you can do and what you are, and that you're second generation. They know what they're up against, and we know what we're up against. This is a new war that we've started."

He grinned, all apparent anger gone from his face. "Except this time, we're going to win for good."

We stared at each other for a good minute before he glanced at his watch and clapped a hand on my shoulder.

"Don't get in trouble, don't do anything stupid, and don't die."

He jumped away.

I could almost see the cloud of black squiggly lines above my head that they have in cartoons when the cartoon character is pissed or something. I guess Mily saw it too, because after my discussion with Griff, I wandered out into the kitchen and sat down at the bar. She leaned forward.

"What can I get for you?"

"Rum on the rocks." I cocked my head to the side. "Is that even a drink?"

She smiled. I'd never met Mily before this morning, when she had jumped in from…wherever the hell she was before this. Griff didn't especially like her, so whenever she was around, he made his best effort to spend as little time here as possible, or, when he was here, he made a point to not hang around with her. I, however, rather enjoyed her company. She was a refreshing person, especially since I was apparently being prepared for a hell.

"How about coke?"

I nodded and she poured it into a glass with ice, handing it to me. "You going a little stir crazy?"

I nodded again. "Griff and Davy both want me to stay here but…I have things to do."

That was only part lie. I did have things to do, but they weren't pressing.

I looked up at her.

"What's second generation?"

She paused for a second. "Second generation is the kind of jumper you are. Like, Davy and Griff and myself are first generation jumpers, and you're second generation. You can do more than we can, but we can probably do something that you can't do because…well, you don't need it anymore."

"So basically it's evolution," I say, taking a sip. She shrugs.

"Sort of. It's more like….adaptation. I don't know exactly how it works. I do know that you develop the ability when you are put into a dangerous situation. But I don't know how you leave no jump scar while the rest of us do."

"What happened to you that made you jump?" I asked Mily. She scrunched up her face a little in concentration.

"Well, long story short, David and I have this house, I tried to escape, I didn't fare so well and next thing I knew I was in my apartment. It was weird."

She refilled my glass and placed it back in front of me.

"What about you?"

I went quiet for a moment. She had told me a few days ago how David's first jump had happened, and now I knew about her. I guess mine wasn't really that different.

"My brother and I played hide and seek a lot. We had this huge wood behind our house and we could spend hours playing back there. On the other side there was a major road and one time I thought it would be great if I just wandered all the way through the woods and crossed the road to hide in the creekbeds on the other side. I got to the road, looked both ways, started to cross. This car comes speeding around the corner when I'm halfway across and I stop dead, close my eyes and scream."

She's staring at me intently. "How old were you?"

"Like, five. When the car doesn't hit me, I open my eyes and I'm in the back of my dad's truck."

A smile creases my lips. "Then my brother slaps his face against the window and screams 'I've found you! What the fuck, Jer, it's been three hours!'"

She smiles and pulls a stool up to sit across from me.

"How old was your brother at the time?"

"Ten. So he's…twenty-two now."

"Do you know where he is?"

"Army."

"Do you talk to him at all?"

"Not really. He split when he was eighteen and I was thirteen."

Mily nodded sympathetically. I took a long drink from the glass. I hadn't thought about these things in a while. I wasn't sure if now was the time to drag them back up.

Mily sat up a little bit, resting her elbows on the counter and putting her chin in her hands.

"Why the back of your dad's truck? My safe spot is my apartment, for obvious reasons. But why the back of the truck?"

I opened my mouth, then shut it. Mily must have noticed, because she told me that if I didn't want to talk about it, I didn't have to. But I shook my head and started to talk.

"My dad wasn't the greatest guy on the face of the earth. He used to screw Dev up really badly whenever he did something wrong. I could hear it. Whenever Dev knew that something was going to happen, he'd tell me to go and hide in the truck so our dad couldn't get to me. And I did. And then when our dad was done, Dev would come out and hang with me until he knew Dad had calmed down. And I'd usually be asleep by then, so Dev would either just sleep in the truck with me or, if it was too cold, carry me inside."

"What about your mom?"

"I killed her."

Her face fell and she straightened up a little. I reworded my sentence.

"I mean like, she died when giving birth to me." My life was beginning to sound like a soap opera. I didn't think I was so cynical about everything, but I guess it turned out that I was naturally cynical and had a certain attitude around people. At least, that's what the police always said

"Oh." She smiled. "Then you didn't kill her. She gave her life so you could live."

I shrugged. Sometimes I wished that my mom was still around and that I was gone. I felt Mily's hand on my own, comforting me.

"Sorry I made you think about it," she said. I shook my head.

"Not your fault."

"So you never really knew her…just your brother and dad?"

I nod, scratching at a nonexistent itch on my arm. I was never really very comfortable talking about my past, as it brought up bad memories of talking to the school psychologist about things I didn't care much for.

I looked up at Mily. "So, do you know what David and Griffin want me to be able to do?"

She shrugged, taking my glass and moving to the counter, placing it in the sink.

"They always talk about starting an army of some sort, and now that they know there's a new breed of jumpers out there, they know that they can get going on it. They've got you here, they've been looking for other kids your age that they know can jump." She turned to face me. "They want to take down the Paladin…and they really need your help. It's turning into a full blown war, now that they've gotten information on you. You're saving your life and the lives of innocent people. They won't hesitate to take people you love hostage…"

She paused, as if she had said something wrong. I arched an eyebrow.

"What?"

"I…" she stuttered. I smiled.

"You think I don't have anyone."

Mily ran a hand through her hair, letting the tresses fall over her shoulders and shrugged. "Sorry. I just don't know a lot about you. David just kind of…"

"Stuck me here?"

"Yeah."

"I have two people," I said. She grinned wolfishly.

"Girlfriend?"

I arched an eyebrow, but before I could say anything, Griffin jumped into the area, and, giving both of us a serious look, said:

"We've got to go."

"Why?"

"We've found another Jumper…but he's in bad shape. Plus, the Paladin have David."

I wasn't sure if the look on his face as he said that last part was annoyance or genuine panic, but he fixed his eyes on Mily.

"You stay here," he said. Turning to me, he grinned.

"It's time to see what you're made of, kid."


	4. Chapter 4

**I was threatened..! This chapter is dedicated to jxr1, who warned me and made me get my ass into gear. It's 12:41 right now, and I have chapter 5 halfway done for you kids already, okay? I've been working on this chapter but just sort of let it go for a while while I tried to pull my life together. Sorry to leave you hanging, and sorry to give you such a lame-ass chapter. Call it a filler before the next ne. Whatever. Peace.**

* * *

We jumped to Seattle, which, despite the fact that it was late at night, was very much awake. I fought the urge to satisfy my need for a hugh cup of Starbucks and followed Griffin down an alleyway, where another guy was slumped up against the wall. I could tell that he was dead, and I could feel my stomach tighten involuntarily. Griff hissed out a curse and kneeled by him, while I tried to get my mind off of it. I turned to the city, watching its twinkling lights against the night sky. It definitely had the ambience of a city fueled by Starbucks, but the calmness of the night. I had never been to Seattle. Actually, there were a lot of places I hadn't been.

Suddenly, the crackle of electricity ripped through the night, and on instinct, I ducked. Overhead, I saw the metal cables crash into the brick wall of the apartment I stood by, and could feel their power just inches above my head. I turned my head down to look between my chest and arm and I saw them.

Griffin reappeared behind them, grinning.

"Back for more, are we boys?"

He promptly kicked the one that had the gun that was pointing at me in the back, sending him flying forward, breathless. There were still two more that needed to be dealt with. On an impulse, I jumped behind one of them that held another one of those weird gun things, but he anticipated it and had raised his hand, connecting his fist with my nose almost as soon as I appeared.

I swore, loudly, holding my left hand to my nose. He started to point it at me, but I was quicker. Jumping behind him again, I grabbed him around the waist, jumped him to the top of a billboard that I could see about a quarter of a mile away. Once he was up there, I dropped him.

I left before I could hear the thud of his body and the sickening crunch of bones and blood.

I jumped back to where Griffin was, standing over the body of the other guy and pointing the guy's own weapon at him.

"Did you get rid of him?" he asked me, looking up. I watched the guy under his foot.

"Yeah."

He looked at my nose, which was streaming blood and staining my face. "Way to go."

The man underneath his foot started writhing around, so Griff pointed the weapon at him again and he stopped. "So, what's your deal? I mean, I've dealt with you assholes before, but y'know, this is an all time low."

Music started playing in my head. I'm rather fond of All Time Low.

"...when I was sixteen, you guys thought it was cool to go ahead and kill little kids. So, you've grown up. Now you go after teenagers--"

He held up a finger, as if reconsidering.

"...well, you go after teenagers after you kill their parents, yeah?"

The man shook his head, ignoring Griffin and pointing at me. "You're all they want. You'll be dead before you know it."

I glared at him.

"Is that a threat?"

"They know more about you than you know about yourself. It's only matter of time--"

"Shut up."

"They're just waiting for you to make one wrong move. They'll find you. Just like they found your brother and your father. And they'll find you, too," he said, pointing to Griffin.

Griffin reached down and nicked the guy's cellphone and wallet off of him, tossed it to me. "Name?"

I opened the wallet. "Thayer Maston." Other than several fake Ids in there, he had seven credit cards, a Starbucks card, what looked like a keycard, and seven hundred dollars—all twenties. I showed Griffin the keycard, before pocketing it, and he nodded. I also pocketed the money because...well, maybe I'd want to go shopping. Griffin shook his head. Then, he leaned down right into the guy's face.

"Where's David?"

"David's good as dead," Thayer sneered. Griffin aimed and shot, sending what I could only imagine as possibly thousands of volts of electricity through him. After several moments of watching this, he stilled. I couldn't keep the disgust off of my face. Griffin tossed the weapon aside, grabbed the guy by his foot, jumping. I stayed put, not really sure if I was supposed to follow or not. He reappeared several seconds later, alone. I arched an eyebrow.

"I'm sure that the FBI will be very interested in what he has to say."

"He wasn't dead?"

"Nah. If it can't kill us, it won't kill him."

I blinked, but he grinned and jumped again. I followed his jump scar and found myself back in the apartment/the Lair.

* * *

Promptly upon arriving back at the apartment, Mily had attacked my nose with antiseptic, bandages and gauze. She'd also given me two Vicodin to pop, which only made my head swim more. But then she disappeared. Mily was all cut up because David had disappeared, because he was in the hands of the Paladin, and that was really the last place that we wanted him to be. Griffin and I spent a majority of the night poring over maps.

"The Paladin have four major locations," he said, straightening up and staring down at the map. I sat on the floor, in front of the glass table that we had our spread out on, trying to think.

"We've destroyed the one in the Mojave Desert, and the one in Milan has been gone for years—burned out by a freak fire accident. The only two left are..."

He pointed to a spot down, at the very bottom of the map. "Antarctica's one, and the other is the facility where you were at. But I doubt they'd take Davy there, considering that we know where it is."

I stared at him.

"We're going to _Antarctica_?"

"Yeah. We're gonna need to go shopping first, though."

* * *

I learned some very valuable things from Griffin. One, he showed me where to get tons of money. I followed his jump scar into a bank vault, where there was stashed what must have been sheer millions of dollars. Then, we jumped to a mall, where we stocked up on warm clothes, boots, and arctic jackets.

"How are we gonna get there?" I asked, after we'd spent almost six hundred dollars on North Face jackets alone at an outlet mall in California. We must have looked like the two biggest morons on the face of the earth—buying winter jackets when it was nearly seventy degrees outside. We were at a coffee stand—Griffin had an insatiable addiction to lattes. He lifted it to his lips and took a sip, looking over my shoulder. I was shorter than him. It sucked.

"You say you can go somewhere just by looking at a picture?"

I nodded. He took another sip, and I accepted my order when it finally came up. Griffin put his cup down.

"Neither Davy nor I have ever been there—we have a picture, though. The picture is from the base in the Mojave Desert—that's how we found out about you. That's how we found out about a lot of the jumpers that we've tried to get to before the Paladin. It helps when you know what you're doing and when you can jump from place to place quickly without having to worry about travel expenses."

He took another sip and we started walking down the street. The bags of stuff had already been ditched back at the apartment.

"Either way, you're a string enough jumper. Think you can take you and me to where it says in the picture?"

I didn't say anything for a moment. What would happen if I couldn't? Would we both just be lost in the space-time continuum forever? Would we get splinched, like in Harry Potter? Would we actually end up _in_ the picture?  
"I can try," I said, hesitantly. Griffin narrowed his eyes.

"There is no trying with being a jumper. You either do or you don't."

* * *

Back at the apartment, Mily was making sure I was all bundled up correctly.

"I'm fine," I muttered after her third attempt to make me wear a hat. "It's not like we're going to be outside for a long time." I wondered if her compulsion to take care of me was because she and Davy hadn't had kids yet or if it was because I was her newest charity case. I doubted she was the kind of person to take kids under her wing for the hell of it--she seemed like a kindhearted person. But I really didn't want her acting like my mother. Big sister that I'd never had, maybe. But not my mother.

Griffin seemed to understand.

"Leave the kid alone," Griffin muttered. Mily, after her third attempt to wrap a scarf around my neck, stopped and sighed.

"Just bring David back," she whispered. Griffin rolled his eyes.

"Yeah, yeah, can we go already?"

Mily shoots him a glare. Then she turns to me. "Be careful. And when you get back, you have a story to finish."

Griffin coughs, loudly. Mily tousles my hair. Yeah, definitely big sister. I manage to smile at her, despite the mounting panic in my stomach.

He holds up a photograph, frayed at the edges and old. I take a good long look at it, then glance up at Griffin. He holds his hands out.

"Any day now."

I roll my eyes and grab his arm, close my eyes, and concentrate.

* * *

We snapped. I wasn't used to jumping with other people. It's always different, jumping with people. It differs if we're jumping from a photograph or from an actual memory.

We landed exactly from where the photograph had been taken. About a mile off of the actual building (creatively disguised in white), we landed in a whirlwind of snow and ice. Griffin swore.

"You're not very used to this whole "jumping with other people", deal, now are you?"

I shake my head. I was very inexperienced with human contact. In every way.

We jump so we're closer, so we can scope out security systems that they might have. It's now that I realise wearing a bright blue jacket in the middle of the arctic isn't such a good idea after all.

There were two guards on the roof—decked out in black jackets and earmuffs, which I assumed doubled as headphones. When Griffin and I jumped closer, they snapped around, guns at the ready.

Griffin grinned as I have learned only he can. "Here's the plan...there is no plan. This is a game, got it? Cat and mouse, hide and seek, predator and prey."  
I nodded, but I was scared out of my mind. Then I remembered that these were the people that had offed my family, the people that had offed everyone I loved except two, the people that had tried to off me.

I stayed in that mindset.

"Yeah, I've got it."

I jumped.

* * *

**You know what to do. And yes. I know it sort of stinks. But! I was pretty stoked today--I just finished 'JUMPER: Griffin's story". SO good! Read it if you want to know the prologue to Griffin. And just keep in mind that in the movie, he's played by that pretty boy named Jamie Bell. :)**


End file.
